Northwest Aerospace News June | July 2019 Issue No. 9 | Page 65

I
could feel the vibration of the big
twin engines as the broad-shouldered
F-14 Tomcat began the takeoff roll.
Our wingman simultaneously rolled
down the parallel runway at Naval
Air Station Oceana, Virginia. At sea
level and in afterburner, the GE F110
engines were pushing us skyward with
nearly 50,000 pounds of thrust. Within
a few short seconds we were climbing
out into the crystal blue sky over the
dark and cold Atlantic for a 1v1 fight
and then down the coast to North Car-
olina for a low-level, practice bombing
mission.
It had been a scant 30 years from the
days spent daydreaming, to being in
the back seat of the hottest hardware
on the planet, tearing through the wild
blue and pulling G’s. I’d never gotten
to play baseball past college but my
logbook includes P-51 Mustangs to
F-16’s, F-4 Phantoms and B-52’s to
F-15 Eagles. I’d had the chance to
fly in every tactical fighter, strike and
military training jet in the U.S. inven-
tory from the last 40 years … save for
F/A-18 Hornet.
So what was the connection that took a
farm kid who was terrible at math and
gave him the opportunity to be in the
cockpit, travel the world, train, fly and
deploy with our forces in both training
and real world missions — including
combat?
“Please pass me that tube of cadmium
red oil paint and that horsehair brush.
That’s right,” as I tell people who ask
me what I do, ”I stay home and draw
(really paint) pictures of airplanes all
day!” At this point in the conversation,
if they haven’t politely excused them-
selves, thinking they may be talking
to a man with a loose grip on reality, I
explain the world of an aviation artist.
Think of a professional oil painter,
an artist who has honed their skill for
years. The artist is also known for
a keen study and specialization of a
particular subject matter. Maybe it’s
someone like Norman Rockwell and
his uncanny portraits and figures or
Fredrick Remington and his mastery
of the Old West. For me, specialization
over a 30-year career has been the
wonderful world of flight and aviation
history.
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